Nosh Pit

First Look: A la Mode Pies Opens Thursday

Online pie delivery service gets a permanent home on Phinney. Take a look inside before the doors open.

Posted by: Allecia Vermillion on Nov 07, 2011 at 02:15PM4 Comments

Bourbon butterscotch pie. Photo: Lucas Anderson

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Bourbon butterscotch pie. Photo: Lucas Anderson

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Coffee, pie and ice cream. Photo: Lucas Anderson

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The shop’s merchandise includes shirts with saying like ‘Home Slice’ and ‘Pie-curious’. Photo: Lucas Anderson

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Apple and ginger pear pie. Photo: Lucas Anderson

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Pie-makers at work in the theater kitchen. Photo: Lucas Anderson

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On display in the pie case. Photo: Lucas Anderson

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Pie-bound apples. Photo: Lucas Anderson

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A La Mode founder Chris Porter outside his newly brick-and-mortar enterprise. Photo: Lucas Anderson

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Porter adds finishing flourishes to a Mexican chocolate mousse pie. Photo: Lucas Anderson

The arrival of A la Mode Pies is the latest installment in what’s shaping up to be quite a year for openings on Phinney Ridge. Owner Chris Porter founded his pie business as an “online bakery” in October 2009. Last week he moved his operations out of the kitchen at Knee High Stocking Co. and will open the doors of his “little neighborhood pie café” Thursday at 7am.

Porter said he always planned to open a cafe. “I did it kind of backwards.”

The shop, located at 5821 Phinney Ave N, will serve all the pies currently listed on the website, as individual slices and whole pies. Porter is also bringing back the petite pies he used to sell, which is essentially a pie for two. He’ll serve espresso from Caffe Umbria and ice cream from Bluebird, which opened its own outpost last month less than a mile to the north.

“It’s A la Mode Pies, so you’ve got to have pretty good ice cream,” he says. Bluebird also created a signature flavor for A la Mode based on Porter’s tropically fruity Blue Hawaiian pie.

Pie-philes can also buy merchandise to aid in baking, consuming, serving or generally declaring one’s love for pie. Some time in the next year, Porter says he’s planning to expand into savory items, namely quiche.

It’s not terribly difficult to remember when the shop is open: 7 to 7 seven days a week. The space has just a handful of seats and a glassed-in kitchen where one can watch pastry chefs at work. Porter says he’ll continue the free delivery that helped him build his business, from 10 to 2 every day.

Tags: Phinney Ridge, Delivery and Take Home, Pie, Lunchtime Delivery